All the News You Didn’t Even Know Was Going Down

It’s been about a month and a half since our last roundup, and the several times when we have attempted to sit down and write this column, the amount of things happening has simply made it not possible. For this we apologize, we do hope to stay up on these weekly roundups, especially as more and more campaigns and struggles are lost to the winds of Facebook or are simply forgotten.

We want to pause for a moment and point out that we are at an interesting time in history, in that there is no single ‘mass movement’ or vortex. There is no one single thing like Occupy or Black Lives Matter that is bringing people out in the streets, instead, we see a growth of struggles and battles happening across the social terrain. In prisons, around pipelines, against the Alt-Right, around housing and gentrification, against ICE raids, in workplaces, and beyond. Moreover, we see these struggles pushing against the stranglehold of Leftist bureaucracy in exciting ways, from the self-organization seen in the West Virginia teachers’ strike, to the success of mass antifascist organizing.

We’re also seeing explosions of working-class anger and action that is often looked over by the Left, such as the massive Eagles riots that went down in Philadelphia that took on a clearly anti-police and anti-Trump sentiments. It’s also worth noting that these riots were largely brushed aside by the regime and the media, in the hopes that they wouldn’t spread.

At the same time, this week will see walkouts take place across the US, as students will engage in school protests in remembrance of those killed in Parkland, Florida. While these walkouts are being contained and managed by the Women’s March (supposed to only take place for 17 minutes in a symbolic action of the lives lost in Florida) and we remain critical of their ability to do anything beyond march youth into the arms of the Democratic Party, we also at the same time hope that youth use these walkouts as an opportunity to push beyond the limitations of the gun control vs video games narrative set in place by the established culture, and get to the root of capitalist civilization instead.

Meanwhile, our comrades in Afrin are fighting and dying to prevent an even larger mass slaughter, as Turkish forces are attempting to crush and destroy the Rojavan revolution. We must ask ourselves, if we were alive during the Spanish Revolution, and we were watching our comrades on the cusp of being massacred by fascist and Stalinist forces, how would we react?

In that spirit, let’s get to the news.

Indigenous Resistance

Indigenous activists calling for justice for Colten Boushie shut down main st & portage ave in Winnipeg on Sunday. Many of the First Nations people who took part in the demo expressed their frustration over the not guilty verdict for Gerald Stanley. #JusticeForColtenpic.twitter.com/zN23j8Pwbs

Over the first weeks of March, protest encampments continued in the wake of juries finding white settlers not guilty in the murders of indigenous people. CBC news reported:

Following the Justice for Tina Fontaine rally this past Sunday in Toronto, a youth-led occupation has set up camp outside Old City Hall in downtown Toronto. The group set up three tents Sunday on the southwest portion of the grounds of the building that currently functions as a provincial courthouse.

“We’re trying to create a space where we can engage with community and have conversations but also try to make and encourage active change to the justice system and the child welfare system,” said Ezra Green, a Mi’kmaw activist from Peterborough, Ont.

Green is part of the Indigenous Youth Movement, a Toronto-based group made up of water protectors and land defenders. Green and Koryn John set up the camp, inspired by the Soaring Eagles camps in western Canada.

Here at Swanson Occupation the situation continues to escalate. This morning, an unexpected and unannounced visit from the RCMP who are making their presence known as restocking of Marine Harvest’s fish farm continues. Despite our clear opposition, Marine Harvest continues to violate our environment, our salmon and our people.

Meanwhile in Victoria, Tsastilqualus Ambers Umbas of the Matriarch Camp, along with other family members were arrested for holding space at DFO offices. “We demand an end to these fish farms!” We call all wild salmon protectors to action, and to continue to put pressure on the Governments, DFO and the RCMP to do the right thing.

All the while, we’re grateful to the fine folks who turned up for the rally at MLA George Heyman office to show their opposition to this dirty fish farm industry. We want the fish farms out now!

End the genocide against us!

In Minneapolis, people marched for Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women. Check out the video below:

Rooted in concern over climate change, oil spills, species extinction and indigenous rights, the battle lines are drawn — just as they were at Standing Rock in North Dakota, where thousands of Native peoples and their allies sought to stop the Dakota Access Pipeline.

“I will lay down my life to stop this,” Cedar George-Parker of the Tulalip and Tsleil-Waututh nations said of Trans Mountain pipeline, as demonstrators massed at a rally at the end of the march.

Not just a one-day march but an ongoing movement, the Protect the Inlet campaign that launched Saturday is intended to keep pressure on the expansion project until it is stopped, by delay, disruption and ongoing civil disobedience.

The march terminated near a clearing in a cedar grove in the shadow of Kinder Morgan’s tank farm, where opponents erected a cedar structure, Place to Watch From. Opponents vowed to occupy and utilize the house as a ceremonial encampment to stop the pipeline.

Kinder Morgan said the structure is in its right-of-way and that it would request the city of Burnaby to issue a stop-work order. The company supports the right to peaceful protest but also is certain the project can be built safely and in accordance with the values of all Canadians, said spokeswoman Ali Hounsell.

Indigenous women from Canada’s interior have launched The Tiny House Warrior movement and are building structures in the path of the pipeline. The wave of civil disobedience follows a turnover of the government of the Province of British Columbia, which has filed a lawsuit to overturn permits from the previous government.

Our fearless team took a plunge into Bemijigamaag-zaaga’igan to raise awareness about proposed Line 3 (and the current Line 3 abandonment) yesterday.

It was freezing cold (in and out of the water) and afterward, we all heaved an ice shanty onto the lake to continue spreading the word about perilous pipelines in our absence.

Chi miigwech to everyone who came out to support, to our trusty shanty crew Kristi and Ben, to the artists who helped create our banners, and to the nibi (water) itself for hosting us!

In West Virginia, an emergency closure has been put into place where a resistance camp and tree sit has been established, as clear cutting of the Appalachian forest has begun to make way for construction. As the tree sit gains steam, pipeline bosses have begun a legal attempt at removing tree sitters in the path of the Mountain Valley Pipeline, meanwhile, construction continues to get closer and closer to the established tree sit. As Appalachians Against Pipelines wrote:

This is a video from the tree sit on the WV side of Peters Mountain in Monroe County. Workers from Mountain Valley Pipeline are using chainsaws to clearcut trees along the path of the easement. The video shows that this work is happening very close to the pipeline resisters. DONATE to support pipeline resistance in Appalachia:http://bit.ly/SupportMVPResistance

This is a video from the tree sit on the WV side of Peters Mountain in Monroe County. Workers from Mountain Valley Pipeline are using chainsaws to clearcut trees along the path of the easement. The video shows that this work is happening very close to the pipeline resisters.DONATE to support pipeline resistance in Appalachia: http://bit.ly/SupportMVPResistance

BREAKING. A @GoldmanSachs recruitment event at Harvard was just disrupted over Goldman's investments in Energy Transfer Partners (ETP). Goldman Sachs is the top shareholder of ETP and has lent them millions. #StopETP#NoBayouBridge

Brave activists who locked up to the bulldozer at the extraction oil and gas site next to the Bella Romero Elementary school in Greeley, Colorado on Thursday. This action was historic and the first of its kind against oil and gas here—space (a bulldozer) was occupied and work was stopped for the day.

Smash the Patriarchy

On March 8th, International Women’s Day, anarchists and anti-authoritarians took to the streets in numerous cities. In Spain, anarcho-syndicalist unions too part in a feminist general strike, which was massive. Here are some updates from North America:

Defend the Land

People in Northern California continue to organize against logging in the Mattole forest. Stay up on the latest news here. March 26th – April 1st, Cascadia Forest Defenders will also be hosting a climb camp, more info here.

Break the Borders

Anti-ICE actions continue across the US. In Tacoma, resistance continues a the Northwest Detention Center, and this Thursday will mark the first court date for Maru, a Pacific Northwest migrant organizer who we have interviewed on the IGDcast. More info here.

Our compa Guillermo has been a part of the ATU family as long as we have existed, helping families fight for their rights and stay in their homes. Last Dec. he traveled to Florida to find work for the winter & was detained by ICE. Please share and donate. https://t.co/lTOefNk31w

HAPPENING NOW: Undocumented youth who walked 250 miles from N.Y. to D.C. shutting down the street in front of the U.S. Capitol. They have a simple message; Congress and Trump must stop playing games with our lives. We need the #DreamActNow! pic.twitter.com/orvgbxGzXT

Fire to the Prisons

In Arizona, a massive prison riot ripped through the facility:

Inmates in the Cheyenne unit of the Arizona State Prison Complex-Yuma attacked prison personnel, set fires and threw rocks in an incident that began at 6:18 p.m. Thursday, according to statements issued by the Arizona Department of Corrections. About 600 of the prison’s 1,147 inmates took part, the Corrections Department said.

In Florida, action continued in solidarity #OperationPUSH, with actions taking places on March 8th. One update wrote:

Thanks to an amazing turnout today the FDOC has rescinded their April 7th date for visitation cuts and instead will be scheduling a public hearing. There’s a hundred thousand prisoners in this state, imagine what could be done if we ALL showed up?!? Great job out there today, let’s keep the pressure on!

5th and Stewart in front of Westin where King County Executive, Dow Constantine is expected at Senator Patty Murray’s fundraiserPress Release: https://m.facebook.com/EuropeanDissentSeattle/posts/1853097571660520#NoNewYouthJail #DowCagesKids #JusticeNotJuviePress Release for today's action:FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASESeattle, WA — March 2, 2018Contacts: Julianna Alson: julianna.alson@gmaill.com – 847.630.5171;Alex Brott: Alex.brott32@gmail.com – 707.591.3243Youth Jail Opponents Shut Down 4th Avenue Outside County Administration: Activists Call on Dow Constantine to Immediately Halt Construction of New Youth Jail and CourtsWhat: Activists Locked Down Outside County Administration BuildingWhere: Fourth Avenue and JamesWhen: 8:00 A.M.Today, organizers supporting the No New Youth Jail Campaign shut down Fourth Avenue in front of the County Administration Building to demand Dow Constantine put an immediate stop to the unlawful construction of the new youth jail and courts. For the past five years, Ending the Prison Industrial Complex (EPIC), backed by 60+ grassroots organizations and faith communities, has been fighting a vital battle in the courts and on the streets to stop the construction of the youth jail and court complex, changing the conversation about youth imprisonment in the County, and pressuring the county to adopt a goal of zero detention for youth.Today's action follows the 2017 Court of Appeals ruling finding that King County has been unlawfully collecting property taxes for the proposed youth jail, a ruling that effectively eliminates the majority of the funding for the project. Following the ruling, without any alternative funding source in place, Dow Constantine, the King County Executive, broke ground on the $210 million project, effectively punching a hole in the County's budget that puts at risk other vital county services.The continued construction at the 12th and Alder site runs directly counter to Constantine's stated commitment to zero detention for youth, instead committing the county to a building designed to cage youth for the next fifty years. According to Senait Brown, a lead organizer with EPIC and Youth Undoing Institutional Racism (YUIR), “This fight goes beyond the brick and mortar building. This is about fighting structural, systemic racism, and it has been about that from the beginning. We’re asking the county to really invest in the power and leadership of our young people and our communities. They need to let us build our own solutions.”When the project was proposed in 2012, voters were led to believe that a new facility was necessary due to the “deterioration” of the current jail. However, as the current jail is only 25 years old, a facilities analysis conducted by the county itself showed that it is “generally in good condition." Members of the NNYJ Coalition blocked the streets outside Constantine's office today to demand that Dow and King County not spend one more penny on an unnecessary, harmful, and undeniably racist jail building project.Organizers blasted the County’s misleading language and positive messaging surrounding the project, emphasizing that the construction of the facility would uphold racist systems and strengthen the school to prison pipeline. In the past 10 years King County has reduced youth detention by nearly 75%. However, despite making up only 10% of the King County population, more than 50% of incarcerated youth are black, and the planned facility holds more than double the number of cells currently in use, cells that will be filled with youth of color.As Members of the No New Youth Jail Coalition, four anti-racist white collectives took participated in today's sit-in, calling on fellow white community members to challenge their role in upholding a white supremacist system and to join the fight to deconstruct it. “As a King County Public Health employee, I have witnessed a hush hush culture when it comes to speaking out about the youth jail,” said Kelsen Caldwell, a lead organizer with the Coalition of Anti-Racist Whites. “This is a form of white silence and white violence. We need county employees to speak out and break this silence. I want to know how Dow Constantine can lead a County with an Equity and Social Justice Initiative, which leads with undoing racism, and simultaneously invest in building jails that we all know will disproportionately cage Black and Brown children. How is that equity or justice?”###

Class War

On Saturday, 32,000 state employees in Oklahoma voted to join an April 2 teachers’ strike, which rank-and-file educators have called to demand a $10,000 raise. According to data compiled by educators, 85 percent of teachers and 75 percent of parents support a walkout by educators, who like their counterparts in West Virginia rank near the bottom in the US in teacher salaries.

In Arizona, the teacher unions are similarly seeking to derail a rank-and-file movement of educators. Teachers who have been protesting at the capitol building in Phoenix to oppose stagnating wages, increased class sizes and the lack of state funding, have called for a “Day of Action for Education” for March 28.

Members of the Burgerville Workers Union in the Pacific Northwest continue to fight to bring the corporation to the bargaining table and also to hire back those that have been fired for union organizing. A recent update from BVWU reads:

Shame on corporate! This new Northwest Labor Press article talks in a little more detail about just a few of the firings within Burgerville’s very patterned, very disappointing attack on the people who are the heart of the company. We’re not disposable and we will not be silenced!

One of the biggest incentives HQ2 offers to its prospective cities is its promise to create 50,000 new jobs. This couldn’t be more false. We already know that the high-paying tech positions will not be filled by local residents, but by highly-qualified professionals imported from across the country and around the world. As for the few less-skilled positions, many of those who are currently ‘employed’ by Amazon do not work directly for the company itself, but are hired by third party agencies for temporary contracted labor. This way, Amazon shirks responsibility for providing benefits and worker’s compensation, and workers can be terminated without reason. Temporary work agencies also help Amazon quickly hire new workers to replace those who have been fired, injured, or who have quit, as most employees don’t last more than a few months. This practice of “hire and fire” means that Amazon doesn’t have to worry about giving their workers advancements or raises, and the rapid turnover rate makes it difficult for those who last with the company to organize for better working conditions.

Inside Amazon’s warehouses, workers are treated like prisoners on parole. They are strapped with tracking devices that monitor their productivity in calculated units. These devices link performance measuring algorithms to an automated disciplinary system, where workers are docked “points” for not working hard enough, getting sick, or spending too much time in the bathroom. Amazon has more data regarding its workers than any employer in history, and they use this data to constantly optimize the process of production, quickly terminating and replacing those not operating at maximum efficiency. Maybe this is why Jeff Bezos was recently voted Worst Boss in the World.

Grad students are on strike in Illinois, and also have staged a sit-in occupation in one of their campus buildings. Check out the video here:

In Vermont, hundreds mobilized against Patriot Front, when it was announced that they would hold a small rally. The neo-Nazis were no shows, but held a photo-op in front of a vacant city hall building another town over to save face.

White nationalists were also a no show at UNC in North Carolina, but hundreds of students and antifascists did hold a rally.

Someone saw some fascist posters hanging up at Memorial Park in Flushing. There was even one in a children’s playground… to get the word out on their silly statue worshipping, polo/khaki wearing hate group to 8 yr olds? Anyways, fixed. 🔥🏴 pic.twitter.com/YhOEcgIaRo

Neo-Nazis in Identity Evropa and Patriot Front have been dropping banners in Chicago, but people have been ripping them down as fast as they put them up. In other Chicago news, Unicorn Riot exposes that in a series of Discord leaks, that Patriot Front was using a group of college Republicans as a forum to recruit on campus:

One user in the Patriot Front Discord server, ‘Machinesmiter-IL,’ bragged about how he was secretly using his founding position at the College Republicans chapter at Roosevelt University in Chicago to prime susceptible young white men to be receptive to fascist ideology. He boasted about putting up hundreds of flyers on his campus and the surrounding area, and how on November 4 he “hit Federal Plaza and the whole surrounding area hard… I probably got up at least 150-200 posters downtown.”

#DefendJ20

The next J20 trial is coming up soon. The State currently is stating that it will call to the stand an undercover informant from 7 years ago who infiltrated “anarchist extremist groups.” Ironically, seems the extreme ‘group’ she was involved in did absolutely nothing, however she did go to protests against globalization and war. The State will attempt to use this government agent as an “expert” on the black bloc.

#FreetheBlackPride4

A day of action on March 12th took place for the Black Pride 4, and it’s great to see so many people taking action. Here’s a roundup:

On March 7th, toll booth takeover in Guerrero by Ayotzinapa parents took place.

Today, parents & classmates of the 43 disappeared from #Ayotzinapa took over a highway toll booth in Guerrero, allowing vehicles to pass for free & handing out info on the upcoming National Popular Convention. They were surrounded & threatened by 200 federal & state police. https://t.co/zwMht96e1S

On March 8th, the Zapatistas had a large Women’s Gathering. On March 9th, clashes in Durango broke out, as teachers and members from 7 communities put up a blockade to prevent construction of a cyanide plant. Attacked by police, 65 arrested, 17 injured, while police claim 34 of them were injured.

Footage from clashes on Friday after police attacked protesters in Durango who were blockading construction of a cyanide plant by the US company @chemours. 65 people were arrested as police raided homes. At least 17 protesters injured, including one by police gunfire. https://t.co/idX3n8sgGs

On March 10th, teachers’ union members and leadership from Chiapas were traveling in Veracruz back to Chiapas. The governor detained the entire bus and took all of them to a military base, claimed they blockaded roads in the capital and were “troublemakers” for Morena.

Shout Outs

Tours are still ongoing! CrimethInc, Mutual Aid Disaster Relief, West Coast J20 tour, as well as our friend, Peter Gelderloos. Check it out! Remember, you can record an event for the IGD podcast if you want!

It’s Going Down is a digital community center from anarchist, anti-fascist, autonomous anti-capitalist and anti-colonial movements. Our mission is to provide a resilient platform to publicize and promote revolutionary theory and action.

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It's Going Down is a digital community center from anarchist, anti-fascist, autonomous anti-capitalist and anti-colonial movements. Our mission is to provide a resilient platform to publicize and promote revolutionary theory and action.